Read Chilly Scenes of Winter for Free Online Page A

Laura. Laura’s hair is longer than Susan’s. Laura wears perfume. She wears Vol de Nuit. She gives Vol de Nuit to Jim’s first wife for a present. They sit in the visiting room of the loony bin, smelling the same. Charles feels that he knows the woman, that he has been to the bin, but only Laura and Jim have been there. He hates Jim for getting to spend so much time with Laura, envies him the moments with her in the bin, visiting his first wife, thinks that he would be able to stand watching the woman eat, if only he could go there with Laura. Anywhere with Laura.
    “I’m seeing Laura tomorrow,” he says. “I called her from the hospital.”
    “That’s good,” Susan says. “I hope she’s nice to you.”
    “She’s always nice. She just won’t leave her husband.”
    “Aren’t there other attractive women where you work?”
    “No. They all look and act the same, but the fat ones are a little louder, and the thin ones either bite their nails or twist their hair.”
    “They can’t all be bad.”
    “I can’t make myself look. When I do look, they all look bad.”
    He pulls up in front of a Safeway. “How about some money?” he says.
    “I’ve got plenty of money.” She gets out of the car and he sits there double parked, waiting for her. He hopes she will buy oranges and cream and chocolate and make the dessert for him. When she comes back, she has bought a roasting chicken and stuffing and green peas.
    “What’s the guy you go with like?” Charles says.
    “He’s in pre-med. What do you want to know about him?”
    “Are you going to marry him?”
    “I don’t know. He wants to go to Mexico.”
    “What for?”
    “Just for a vacation. To buy a statue. He’s very smart, but he’s sort of nuts. I haven’t wanted to call him since I got here. He’s on a Mexico thing. He wears brown huaraches and a poncho. He saw the statue he wants to buy in the travel section of The Times.”
    “What do you two do?”
    “He studies a lot. I fix dinner. Sometimes we go to other people’s places. We don’t do much.”
    “Has he got long hair?”
    “Yes,” she says. “How did you know?”
    “Figures,” he says.
    “What’s wrong with that?”
    “Nothing. I wish I had become a surgeon. It’s boring working for the government. At least I make enough money to pay the mortgage. Sam hardly makes enough to pay his rent.”
    “Why doesn’t he live at your place?”
    “My place? I don’t know. That would look strange.”
    “What do you care what it looks like?”
    “I don’t know. I wouldn’t want him there all the time. He’d get on my nerves.”
    “Sam doesn’t get on your nerves. He’s there all the time anyway.”
    “He’d bring all his damn women over.”
    “So what. Maybe they’d have friends.”
    “I’m twenty-seven years old. I ought to be able to find a woman if I want one.”
    “Do you look?”
    “Not much.”
    “Aren’t you lonesome?”
    “Of course I’m lonesome. Why do you keep reminding me?”
    “I don’t like to think you’re lonesome.”
    “I’m not that lonesome. I’m exhausted when I work, and Sam’s around on weekends.”
    “But you’re still lonesome.”
    “For Christ’s sake, Susan.”
    “Maybe if you face it you’ll find somebody.”
    “I’m seeing Laura tomorrow.”
    “That’s not what I meant.”
    “Everybody’s married. And if they’re not, they’re either fat or thin.”
    “You’re deliberately not facing the situation.”
    “You’re nineteen,” Charles says. “Leave me alone.”
    “My age doesn’t have anything to do with it.”
    “Susan, Clara’s finally too bonkers to argue with me. Do you have to carry on for her?”
    Susan looks out the car window. They are going around a traffic circle. A man is in the middle of the circle with a shopping bag and a cane. Cars swerve to avoid him. The old man lifts his cane and shakes it. Charles pulls around him, into the far lane where a Christmas tree lies. The car smashes through the